Black History Month 2025

The Paul Robeson Cultural Center is excited for an inspiring month with various events hosted by the Paul Robeson Cultural Center, Black Student Organizations, and other Rutgers University Departments. 

The 2025 National Black History Month theme is African Americans and Labor

“The 2025 Black History Month theme, African Americans, and Labor, focuses on the various and profound ways that work and working of all kinds – free and unfree, skilled, and unskilled, vocational and voluntary – intersect with the collective experiences of Black people. Indeed, work is at the very center of much of Black history and culture. Be it the traditional agricultural labor of enslaved Africans that fed Low Country colonies, debates among Black educators on the importance of vocational training, self-help strategies, and entrepreneurship in Black communities, or organized labor’s role in fighting both economic and social injustice, Black people’s work has been transformational throughout the U.S., Africa, and the Diaspora. The 2025 Black History Month theme, “African Americans and Labor,” sets out to highlight and celebrate the potent impact of this work.” Association for the Study of African American Life and History.

As we reflect on this year's theme, we hope you can explore the legacy of race and labor in America. Throughout our history, men and women have died in the fight for racially inclusive economic justice. From A. Philip Randolph, who fought for 12 years to gain recognition of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters by the Pullman Car Company, the American Federation of Labor (AFL), and the U.S. government to New Jersey native Chris Smalls, who began organizing in 2020 for the establishment of the Amazon Labor Union (ALU), African-American’s have been at the forefront of these movements. 

Visit the Black History Month website to learn more and view all events and programs.